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A New Angle

The Recreational Boating and Fishing Foundation aims to reel in
more anglers. Will the lure of the simpler pleasures hook them?

For better or worse, the looming recession could prove a
catalyst for relatively inexpensive leisure pursuits, such as
fishing.

It evokes images of Huck Finn, of Andy and Opie ambling down to
the pond, and of stoic Midwestern geezers biding their retirement
in a lazily drifting boat. It is one of those sepia-hazy,
dew-appointed pastimes of that â€œsimpler Americaâ€? that
fewer and fewer people can remember, of a rural republic vs. a
global empire. At very least, it is something your dad used to
do.

Fishing seems an anachronism in this one-button Internet-access,
multitasking world, where cell phones and laptops enable work's
creeping encroachment into leisure hours, and where two kids in
every classroom are diagnosed with Attention Deficit Disorder. Who,
after all, has time for such lazy, uncomplicated, Zen leisure
between 70-hour work-weeks, two careers per household, and children
coming of age? How does such a rustic notion strike a chord with a
largely urban, techno-centric population buffeted by dog-eat-dog
lifestyles accessorized by the latest, hottest, hippest? And yet,
the irony of this setup is that it may provide an inarguable,
self-sustaining rationale for the pitch of the new ad campaign for
the Recreational Boating & Fishing Foundation (RBFF), in spite
of the difficult waters the organization is attempting to
navigate.

A nonprofit consortium of industry associations and government
agencies, the RBFF raised a few eyebrows this spring with its
â€œWater Works Wondersâ€? campaign. Introduced on
big-ticket national media, such as CBS's NCAA tournament coverage,
the TV component of the campaign offers richly photographed,
idyllic images of people of all sizes and colors idling in each
other's heartfelt company. Different voices, young and old, bid,
â€œTake me fishing â€¦and make me feel 16 again,â€? or
â€œâ€¦because my wedding will be sooner than you
think.â€?

At first blush, it is an evocative, heart-massaging campaign,
its peaceful images and lyrical copy a welcome oasis on cluttered
adscape of noisy product pitches. This is not mere happenstance.
The RBFF, which did not respond to interview requests, took up its
charge three years ago with an exhaustive battery of research into
why people fish and why they don't do so more often. The number of
active anglers decreased from 35.6 million people aged 16 and
older, to 35.2 million between 1991 and 1996, according to the
Department of the Interior. While not a precipitous decline, it is
ominous when compared with a 20 percent growth in the angling
population through the 1980s.

In its own series of regional telephone surveys conducted by
Responsive Management, a research firm based in Harrisonburg,
Virginia, the foundation discovered that 55 percent of past anglers
cited time constraints as the reason they had curtailed fishing. Of
those, 69 percent cited work obligations as the locus of their time
constraints. So at least among those who'd fished before, the point
of disconnect almost informs the lure of angling. That is, amid our
hectic schedules, we are primed for a much-needed respite, if only
we can find the time and impetus.

Further research supported the notion of fishing as
disconnection with our vocational lives in favor of reconnection
with the private. According to Responsive Management's data and a
1980 U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service study, 35 percent of anglers in
1999 cited relaxation as their reason for fishing, vs. 14 percent
in 1980. Thirty-three percent cited â€œbeing with family and
friendsâ€? in 1999, vs. 19 percent in 1980. Meanwhile, the
traditional sporting or utilitarian purposes for angling declined
proportionally. Only 7 percent of anglers cited sporting as their
reason for fishing in 1999, vs. 20 percent in 1980, while those who
angled to catch fresh fish declined from 28 percent in 1980, to 5
percent in 1999.

And so we see some social validation of the comic stereotype of
the fisherman dropping his line to crack a beer, jaw with buddies,
or simply, in the Buddhist interpretation, push off from cognitive
business. As a result, receptive ears might well be fielding the
pitch.

â€œOne of the most common tensions of our time is the
contrast between living in this upgradeable society, where
everything is faster and faster, and a sense of, as I've called it,
â€˜Stop-the-World-I-Want-to-Get-Off,â€™â€? says Myra
Stark, senior vice president and director of knowledge management
at Saatchi & Saatchi, New York.

Stark sees fishing as a pastime that can easily fall under the
aegis of a broader middle-class trend toward a more deliberate,
simpler existence. Witting or unwitting apostles of Thoreau, these
citizens have come to re-examine their lifestyles from three
separate, yet often interconnected, paths: spirituality, nostalgia,
and voluntary simplicity. Spirituality has cropped up less as a
religion-specific phenomenon and more as a yearning for touchstones
outside the mundane; a â€œspiritual individualism,â€? Stark
says, â€œa little bit of yoga, a little bit of religion, a
little bit of communing with nature.â€? Nostalgia's
psychological engine is, as Stark defines it, â€œyearning for a
simpler, better time.â€? Both notions weave in with what is
perhaps a more distinctive social/consumption wave called
â€œvoluntary simplicity.â€?

This latter-day Waldensian notion began in the early 1990s as a
fringe, green-tinted rejection of the Babylonian couture of the
1980s. Though not all embracing Thoreau's pure asceticism, many
adherents of voluntary simplicity have basically bowed out of the
rat race, and taken to lower-paying jobs in exchange for less
stressful, less consumptive, and more eco-friendly lifestyles. By
1997, the Trends Research Institute in Rhinebeck, New York found
that 12 percent to 15 percent of Americans were practicing
voluntary simplicity, qualified as actively reducing their
families' consumption and expense, and separating quality of life
from material goods. â€œThese are very strong trends in this
country, and fishing fits in with them perfectly,â€? says
Stark.

The foundation's own research would seem to bear this out. In a
block of regional studies, 62 percent to 69 percent of non-anglers
said they would be encouraged to fish if asked to do so by a child,
while 58 percent to 65 percent said they would respond positively
if invited by a friend. Meanwhile, at least 80 percent of past
anglers in all regions said they would go fishing more often if
invited by a child or a friend.

But the big question is whether the RBFF can lure enough past
and prospective anglers out of the rat race, especially monied Baby
Boomers who will soon have more and more time on their hands.
Fishing rates per age group peak at the 35- to 44-year-old range,
with around 22 percent of that group active in the sport. Those in
the 45- to 54-year-old category hold relatively steady: 20 percent
of them still go fishing. The number drops to 15 percent of 55- to
64-year-olds, then 9 percent of those 65 and older, as they opt for
more packaged, all-inclusive vacations that require less autonomous
action. The RBFF would seem to be fighting the age wave of the Baby
Boom, as it grows the 55- to 64-year-old group by some 47 percent
over the next decade.

Still, we should keep in mind that generational proclivities
often re-map current age patterns. This Aquarian generation may be
among the most amenable to the tug of nostalgia and voluntary
simplicity, not to mention heartfelt entreaties to quality moments
with children and grandchildren. And beyond that, for better or
worse, the looming recession could prove a catalyst for both the
voluntary simplicity movement and relatively inexpensive leisure
pursuits, such as fishing. The voluntary simplicity movement gained
its footing amid the lean economic times of the early 1990s, when,
as Trends Research Institute director Gerald Celente puts it, it
qualified as â€œinvoluntary voluntary simplicityâ€? for
many families. And while it has held relatively steady since 1997,
the southward trend of the economy and the latest tsunami of
downsizing may usher more consumers, voluntarily or not, to simpler
pleasures.

â€œIt's like all these great songs you hear from the 1930s,
about how â€˜The Best Things in Life Are Free,â€™ and
sentiments like that, because people couldn't afford the other
things,â€? says Celente. â€œThese days, we're of a consumer
mentality that, the more money you make, the more things you can
buy, therefore the happier you are. But if you don't know if you're
going to have a job next year, you're not going to go into debt as
readily, and you're going to rethink what the best things in life
are. [In such a context] things like [fishing] are only going to
grow.â€?

Indeed, disconnect may just be the most immediate utility of a
gradual return to America's lakes and rivers. Who knows â€” as
the Wall Street bubble continues to deflate, more anglers may, as
they used to, look to their poles and lines to put food on the
table.